Smith, of Quincy, will prepare this paper on Mr. Collins. Dr. Smith was a warm friend of Mr. Collins and was in a position to appreciate his qualities of mind and heart and do justice to them in this address.

The annual address of the Society will be presented at Evanston by Hon. Clark E. Carr, the president of the Society.

Prof. F. I. Herriott, of Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa, has been invited to address the Society on the subject of the German element in the Republican Convention of 1860, and has accepted the invitation. The joint meeting of the several historical associations will continue from the 17th to the 20th of May.

A copy of the completed program of the combined sessions will be mailed the members of the Society before the meeting.

The members of the Illinois State Historical Society are urged to make special efforts to attend the meeting at Chicago and Evanston. As stated above due notice will be given the members in advance of the meeting.

THE BURIAL AND RESURRECTION OF

BLACK HAWK.'

Dr. J. F. Snyder.

An interesting instance of the persistence of pristine mortuary customs of the Indians was observed, in 1870, by the writer, in the former territory of the Osages near the Arkansas river, above Wichita. At the head of a small grave mound in one of their old cemeteries was still standing the remnant of a thick walnut board, rotted and broken by long exposure to the weather, on which were many strange figures deeply carved, and the whole surface painted in blue, red, and green colors, yet but little faded. The grave was but three feet deep, and contained the much decayed skeleton of a young girl, buried there probably fifty years before. On the wrists and ankles were brass rings, and around the neck a necklace of glass beads of various colors, among which were strung three U. S. Army brass buttons and a U. S. Army belt buckle. At one side of the skull was a white graniteware tea cup, in which were a few bird bones and other fragments of the food it originally contained, covered over with a large mussel shell. At the other side of the head was an ordinary glass bottle, no doubt filled with water when placed there. Here were presented all the conditions of the earliest Indian burials; the tea cup and glass bottle substituted for similar ancient vessels of clay pottery, and the glass beads and brass ornaments in

1 This paper is a modified and corrected reproduction of "The Burial of Black Hawk" I wrote for the Magazine of American History in May. 1886. J. F. S.

place of those wrought by their remote ancestors from bone, shell, and native copper.

In the burial of Black Hawk, by his band, could be discerned traces of analogous ancestral customs.

An eminent American ethnologist, in the course of a public lecture, in 1881, to support his contention that many of our Indian tribes continued, until a late period, the erection of sepulchral mounds over the remains of their distinguished dead, stated that Black Hawk's kinsmen, "after having deposited the body of their venerated chief in a grave six feet deep, heaped over it a great mound of earth several feet in height."

Inquiring of the lecturer his sources of information for this interesting fact—that the Sacs and Foxes were mound builders as late as 1838-he referred me to Henry R. Schoolcraft, LL. D., who, half a century ago, was our highest authority on matters pertaining to the North American Indians, and who, a few years before, compiled for the government six ponderous quarto volumes, profusely illustrated, entitled, "The History, Condition and Prospects of the Indian Tribes of the United States." The author of that great work was one of the few men of education who, at that period, had devoted much time to the personal observation and study of Indian customs and character. Dr. Schoolcraft passed thirty years of his life among our Indian tribes, and his wife was the granddaughter of an Indian chief. He visited almost every tribe living between the eastern seaboard and the Rocky Mountains; consequently the accounts he gave of them, in his many publications, were, in his time, regarded as exhaustive and thoroughly reliable.

The career of Black Hawk is familiar to all readers of western history. For some time he was a prominent figure in the affairs of this State, and caused our struggling settlers much trouble and many hardships, which, however, were in a measure compensated by the glory he unwittingly shed upon the administration of

Governor Reynolds. His contest with the young chief, Keokuk, for supremacy in his tribe, and of his gallant, but hopeless efforts to regain the homes and graves of his ancestors, are now a fading page of history, and he is known chiefly as merely the instigator of a petty hostile incursion of a wretched band of his followers on our unprotected frontier border. Yet, as late as 1886, many of our citizens then living had seen him, and some of them personally knew him well. Intelligent white men then resided near the spot where he died, and were cognizant of every detail of his burial. Considering these facts, it seems strange that the particulars of his death and burial should have been unknown to Mr. Schoolcraft, when he could so easily have obtained correct information of every circumstance attending the event. But he disposes of the famous warrior's last days and final interment in the following brief terms (Vol. VI, p. 454): "He was safely conducted to his home on the distant Mississippi, where he lived many years, a wiser and a better man. After his death his tribesmen gave to his remains those rites of sepulture which are only bestowed upon the most distinguished men. They buried him in war dress, in sitting posture, on an eminence and covered him with a mound of earth." No dates are given; nor is the location of his "home on the distant Mississippi" indicated; nor is there any mention of ceremonies at his grave, or any fact stated by which the magnitude of the "mound of earth" covering him can be estimated.

One of the several biographies of Black Hawk that had appeared prior to that of Frank E. Stevens, in 1903,' was that of Benjamin Drake, published in Cincinnati in 1848. The account given of the noted warrior's burial in this little volume was communicated to Mr. Drake by Col. Charles C. Whittlesey, the eminent scientist of Cleveland, Ohio, who, a few years before, when engaged in

The Black Hawk War, including a review of Black Hawk's Life. By Frank E. Stevens, Chicago, 1903.

the geological exploration of Wisconsin Territory, had journeyed "to the far west, about the mouth of the Des Moines river," and had learned from settlers in that distant wilderness these facts related by Mr. Drake, on page 246, as follows: "After his death he was dressed in the uniform presented to him by the President, or Secretary of War, and placed upon a rude bier, consisting of two poles with bark laid across, on which he was carried by four or five of his braves to the place of interment, followed by his family and about fifty of his tribe (the chiefs being all absent). The grave was six feet deep and of the usual length, situated upon a little eminence about fifty yards from his wigwam. The body was placed in the middle of the grave in a sitting posture, upon a seat constructed for the purpose. On his left side the cane given him by Mr. Henry Clay was placed upright, with his right hand resting upon it. Many of the old warrior's trophies were placed in the grave, and some Indian garments, together with his favorite weapons. The grave was then covered with plank, and a mound of earth, several feet in height, was then thrown over it, and the whole enclosed in pickets twelve feet high. At the head of the grave a flagstaff was placed bearing our national banner, and at the foot there stands a post on which is inscribed in Indian characters his age."

Until 1863 this account was copied in our histories as authentic, and comprised all that to that time had been published relating to the disposition of Black Hawk's remains.

It is generally known that when he returned from Washington and his tour of the eastern cities, in 1837, Black Hawk settled, with a remnant of his band of Sacs and Foxes, including his relatives and personal adherents, on the reservation set apart for them by the government, by previous treaty, on the Des Moines river in the (then) Territory of Iowa; and the old warrior's cabin